So that although after a year there was, perhaps, on the whole, no
progress in learning, the affair wore a tolerably encouraging aspect;
for the academy had increased in numbers, and two old fellows, liking
the notion of the broth and the 6d. a month--one a barber, Will Potts,
ruined by a shake in his right hand, the other a drunken pensioner, Phil
Doolan, with a wooden leg--petitioned to be enrolled, and were,
accordingly, admitted. Then Aunt Becky visited the gaols, and had a
knack of picking up the worst characters there, and had generally two or
three discharged felons on her hands. Some people said she was a bit of
a Voltarian, but unjustly; for though she now and then came out with a
bouncing social paradox, she was a good bitter Church-woman. So she was
liberal and troublesome--off-handed and dictatorial--not without good
nature, but administering her benevolences somewhat tyrannically, and,
for the most part, doing more or less of positive mischief in the
process.
And now the general ('old Chattesworth,' as the scornful Magnolia
called him) drew near, with his benevolent smirk, and his stiff bows,
and all his good-natured formalities--for the general had no notion of
ignoring his good friend and officer, Major O'Neill, or his sister or
niece--and so he made up to Mrs.
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